When vegetables go fractal...

I saw this in my greengrocer's on Saturday and just couldn't pass it by.  The Romanesco cauliflower (or broccoli to some) surely has to be one of the most beautiful vegetables around.  Each tight floret is a perfect spiral, each floret going to make-up the larger spiral that is the whole head.  It looks like something designed by a compulsive doodler with too much time on their hands.

It tastes of... well, somewhere between cauliflower and broccoli I guess - like a cauli but a slightly less aggressive flavour.  If treated fairly lightly when cooking, it looses none of its visual charm and colour.

In creating a recipe for this, I accidentally created a new savoury cocktail - I'm calling it the 'olive-tini' - I couldn't help myself when it came to tasting the liqour pre-cooking. 

Romanesco Olive-Tini!

1/2 Romanesco (or standard) cauliflower, cut carefully into individual florets
3 tablespoons good olive oil
3 tablespoons vermouth (such as Noilly Prat)
Sea salt & pepper
1 teaspoon thyme leaves
1 pinch fennel seeds

Blanch the cauliflower in salted boiling water for 2 minutes.  Drain and refresh in cold water.
Put the remaining ingredients in a pan and taste - that's the olive-tini moment!  Bring to a boil, add the cauliflower, stir and allow to simmer for 2-3 minutes, turning several times.

We served this with some baked pork steaks that had been marinated in olive oil, coriander and cumin (I wish I'd grilled them instead), some paprika-roast spuds and some hummus that I thinned with more oil and lemon juice.

tags: cauliflower  

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